DATASET 01It seems that Anna Miller may have believed she was guided to this river and this house in a recurring dream, as she explains to her Egyptian friend and pen pal, Atef Diab (below).
Dreams can be compelling, and Anna was apparently convinced. But perhaps there were other reasons to disappear into the middle of nowhere and start using fake names. Perhaps it had something to do with the problematic divorce from “Mr. Wrong” and harassment from his “clan” that she mentions in the letter. Perhaps it was more about hiding money and assets, like foreign property. It could certainly be both.
TRANSCRIPT OF LETTER FROM ANNA TO HER EGYPTIAN FRIEND, ATEF DIAB.
[MINOR SPELLING MISTAKES CORRECTED.]
You see, my so called “fate” would have been very different in the past if I would not have married Mr. Wrong at first. When realizing what kind of person he was, I insisted on divorce, against his and his family’s will. His big “clan” vowed eternal vengeance! It was as if the Mafia is your enemy. You know who is behind certain activities, but you never will be able to prove anything.
Most of the harassments of the past years have their roots in the events of over 30 years ago. If it would not have been for my parents, especially Mutti’s sake, who always asked us to return, I would have stayed with Dino in Switzerland. Afterward you always know better than before. So much for this.
On the other hand, it occurred the first time when I was 12 years old, that in a very clear and realistic dream I “foresaw” events that after some weeks, or months—even years—happened exactly in the same way as anticipated. Nobody at the time of the dream could k n o w or hunch these things.
I also saw places in these dreams, which months or years later I r e a l l y happened to visit in the same circumstances as “foreseen”. When I foresaw these places, I did not know where they are, when it will happen. Even knowing of certain events—delightful or sad ones—I never could do anything about them, so as to prevent something unpleasant.
All this in inexplicable to me.
If I would not be afraid to bore you immensely I would relate to you some happenings. But perhaps you are indulgent enough to learn about just one example:
In spring 1985, Mutti was quite well at that time, in a dream (that occurred twice) I lived alone in a “Northern” country (supposed to be Norway or Sweden) in a wooden house, on shore of a strange river. The river was very broad, and its waters once went from South to North, some time later in the opposite direction. Some times there were high waves, and suddenly there was nearly no water. I called it “The Bewitched River” and was scared of it. I was used to water flowing always in one direction, and never “uphill”.
When last year I came to Canada, after 10 days quite by chance I passed a place with a sign on the street: “For sale”. I drove into a long driveway and was shocked! I cried out: “This is it! This is the place I saw and lived in twice the same dream 3 years ago, and there is also the ‘Bewitched River’”.
Without considering too much I bought the place, shipped some of my things, took Suzie and came here—and have exactly the same problems as “foreseen”. (Of course I don’t mention all the “paper-war” with the authorities, etc.)
What do you think about this?
[END TRANSCRIPT]
“SPY SHIT”
Whatever it was, she clearly wanted to protect herself. According to Barbara M.’s son Donny M., sometime in 2013 Anna asked him to sell some equipment she had in a storage locker, things he referred to as “spy shit.” Barbara also said that Anna, shortly before she died, told her about two guns, and that she could take them and sell them. Donny confirmed that he found a German Luger and a Walther PPK in the bedroom dresser, though he could not produce either.
DRP-marked 1936 vintage Walther PPK
German 1918 DWM P.08 Luger Pistol
She had catalogues in both German and English for surveillance equipment and spent thousands of dollars on long range viewers and electronic listening devices from a company called Information Unlimited (which actually still exists!) under the name Linda Swansbourg, collected at a post office box in Hunt’s Point, Nova Scotia.
Mail order catalogue for “Elektronische special-Geräte” (electronic special devices), which were especially expensive and bulky in the late 1980s.
Products on offer in this vintage catalogue include concealed listening devices shaped like bulky ashtrays or comically oversized staplers.
Anna ordered electronic surveillance equipment to a PO box in Hunts Point under the name Linda Swansbourg.
STRANGE PASSPORTS
Anna Miller started using the name (and occasionally Anne with an ‘e’) Miller shortly after she came to Canada in 1989, and even managed to get a passport under that name. Except it wasn’t exactly a valid passport. It was a mail-order product issued by the Principality of Castellania, a defunct micronation used primarily as a tax haven in the 1970s and 80s.
“Created by "Prince Ralph I" and a group of disenchanted Austrians on 17 February 1974, its location, somewhere in the South Pacific, was kept secret. According to one of its leaders, "Castellania is more a state of mind." (SPJ, Strauss 82)” Source
Reisepass issued by the Principality of Castellania
She had another passport—a considerably less realistic document than the Castellania Reisepass—issued by the World Service Authority in the name of Mary Louise Sullivan.
Passport issued by the World Service Authority
Stashed away with these odd documents were order forms from an organization called "The Wild Geese", “dedicated to the preservation of individual privacy and freedom”. The Wild Geese offered services for mail redirection, call forwarding and answering, package receiving—presumably for facilitating the movement of funds to and from foreign bank accounts—as well as all manner of paper documents and certificates, including university degrees.
“If you wish us to send a money order for you in privacy, use a fictitious name and address to stop the prying eyes of U.S. Bankers, corporate swine, government fascists and other gangsters.”
An application form for a Castellanian passport. (Click to enlarge)
Special offer stamped on the Wild Geese order form: “Free Psychotic’s Certificate with order of $6.00.”
It appears that Anna had quite a few things to hide. Of course, these novelty passports would certainly not have convinced bank or embassy employees in a developed country. But they were perfectly sufficient identification to get a calling card or open a post office box in rural Nova Scotia in 1989.
They may also, perhaps, have been enough to satisfy border security in an unsophisticated backwater, such as an isolated jurisdictional accident called the Autonomous District of Pokelogan.
ii. The Pokelogan Papers
This piece of mail was processed in 1989 by the internal postal system in the District and dropped off at the nearest Canada Post sorting centre which passed it on to the recipient, Anna Miller, in the contemporary village of Port Meduse. The stamp seems to be an updated version of the 1960s collection of Pokelogan stamps below, found in Anna's possession uncoupled from any envelope but clearly used.
A 1990 deed search for a parcel of land situated somewhere in the “Autonomous District of Pokelogan.”
MAIL FROM A LIMINAL STATE
This piece of mail (and its stamp) was the first oddity that caught our eye. It was processed in 1989 by an internal postal system and dropped off at the nearest Canada Post sorting centre which passed it on to the recipient, Anna Miller, in the contemporary village of Port Meduse.
The contents of this envelope is the deed search (pictured above) for a parcel of land situated within a territory called the Autonomous District of Pokelogan. It records the property owners from the early 1980s back to the 1920s, when the District was first incorporated. Whether Anna bought or inherited this land, tax documents indicate Anna paid taxes on this parcel of land for almost twenty-five years afterwards.
THE AUTONOMOUS DISTRICT OF POKELOGAN
What makes everything even more bizarre is the 10-day visitors stamp in Anna’s Castellania Reisepass, one of the not-exactly-legit passports in her possession. Why did Anna not enter the District under her real name? Was she concerned about revealing her identity to the Pokelogan state? Or did she want to hide her activity from authorities or private parties in the wider world, and not have any trace of her visit in her valid German passport?
Red seal of the District of Pokelogan stamped into Anna’s passport, along with a date and a 10 day time limit from the Pokelogan Visitors Centre.
So why were these odd, 35-year-old papers bundled in with old family photos and important documents, kept close by the hospital bedside of a dying woman until her last moment? Who was Anna Miller, really? And what kind of a place was the Autonomous District of Pokelogan to draw her there?
Whatever the answer, Anna never returned home after she moved to Canada, not even for a visit.